Preparing for the NBN is far and away the last priority for Australian IT managers, according to survey findings that suggest they're more concerned about finding the skills to support BYOD, mobility and cloud rollouts.

The 50 participants in ZDNet’s NextGen CIO initiative can expect a crash course in the skills and art of business leadership, delivered by Charles Sturt University’s School of Management and Marketing.

Software used internally should still be protected even if there's less risk, and companies should know limitations of copyright law and create holistic regime to safeguard intellectual property, say observers.

Short attention span of younger employees leads to high turnover rate, says software exec, who points to cloud-based platforms as way to engage these professionals and facilitate communications with their supervisors.